8th August >> Fr. Martin's Reflections/Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for Thursday, Eighteenth Week in Ordinary Time (Inc. Matthew 16:13-23): ‘Who do you say I am?’ (2024)

8th August >> Fr. Martin's Reflections/Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for Thursday, Eighteenth Week in Ordinary Time (Inc. Matthew 16:13-23): ‘Who do you say I am?’

Thursday, Eighteenth Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel (Except USA)Matthew 16:13-23You are Peter and on this rock I will build my Church.

When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi he put this question to his disciples, ‘Who do people say the Son of Man is?’ And they said, ‘Some say he is John the Baptist, some Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.’ ‘But you,’ he said ‘who do you say I am?’ Then Simon Peter spoke up, ‘You are the Christ,’ he said, ‘the Son of the living God.’ Jesus replied, ‘Simon son of Jonah, you are a happy man! Because it was not flesh and blood that revealed this to you but my Father in heaven. So I now say to you: You are Peter and on this rock I will build my Church. And the gates of the underworld can never hold out against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven: whatever you bind on earth shall be considered bound in heaven; whatever you loose on earth shall be considered loosed in heaven.’ Then he gave the disciples strict orders not to tell anyone that he was the Christ.From that time Jesus began to make it clear to his disciples that he was destined to go to Jerusalem and suffer grievously at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, to be put to death and to be raised up on the third day. Then, taking him aside, Peter started to remonstrate with him. ‘Heaven preserve you, Lord;’ he said ‘this must not happen to you.’ But he turned and said to Peter, ‘Get behind me, Satan! You are an obstacle in my path, because the way you think is not God’s way but man’s.’

Gospel (USA)Matthew 16:13-23You are Peter, I will give you the keys to the Kingdom of heaven.

Reflections (6)

(i) Thursday, Eighteenth Week in Ordinary Time

According to today’s gospel reading, just at the very moment when Jesus gave Peter a very special role, as the rock on which he would build the church, Peter became not a rock but a stumbling stone, an obstacle, to Jesus. Jesus knew that if he was to remain faithful to the mission God had given him, it would lead down the path of suffering and death. However, Peter tried to tempt Jesus to take an easier path, ‘This must not happen to you’. This was a very powerful temptation and, so, Jesus had to confront it in a very uncompromising way. He turned to Peter and said, ‘Get behind me Satan’. Peter who had just expressed a wonderful insight into Jesus, a God-given insight, ‘You are the Christ, the Son of the living God’, is now addressed by Jesus as Satan. Peter who was inspired by God as one moment, according to Jesus, was being inspired by Satan in the next moment. Peter was a mixture of the good and the not so good. He was both a man of deep faith who could be entrusted by Jesus with great responsibility and a man who become a block to the work that Jesus wanted to do. We are all a little like Peter, a mixture of wheat and weed, to use the imagery of one of Jesus’ parables. After addressing Peter as Satan, Jesus did not go back on Peter’s calling to be the rock on which Jesus’ church would be built. Jesus continued to invest in Peter, to trust that he would turn out well in the end. Indeed, Peter went on to become a good shepherd who laid down his life for his flock, like Jesus. The Lord never gives up on us either. Even after we fail him, he continues to invest in us. He keeps calling us to become the person he wants us to be and knows we can be with his help, the help of the Holy Spirit.

And/Or

(ii) Thursday, Eighteenth Week in Ordinary Time

In this morning’s gospel we see the two sides to Peter. Initially he shows great insight into Jesus, identifying him as the Son of the Living God, and in response Jesus addresses him as the Rock on which he will build his church. However, Peter then goes on to rebuke Jesus for speaking about his passion and death, and in response Jesus addresses him as Satan and as a scandal, a stumbling stone, and obstacle in his path. From Rock to stumbling stone! It is hard to conceive of a greater contrast. Something of that same contrast, even contradiction, is in all of us when it comes to our relationship with the Lord. We have moments when we are in harmony with the Lord’s will for us and other moments when we are in conflict with his will for our lives. Yet the Lord kept faith with Peter, in spite of his failings, and the Lord keeps faith with us too, even when we show ourselves unfaithful to him. According to today’s gospel reading, Jesus built his church on a rather flawed rock, a rock that could quickly become a stumbling stone. When addressing Peter as the rock Jesus refers to the church as ‘my church’. Because it is his church, it will endure, even when those with pastoral responsibility for his church fail. Because the church has the risen Lord present within it until the end of the age (Mt 28:20), the gates of the underworld, the powers of evil and death, will never hold out against it; they will not ultimately triumph. Paul declares that Jesus is the ultimate foundation on which the church is built (1 Cor 3:11). Even when in our weakness as disciples we become stumbling stones, he at least remains our rock.

And/Or

(iii) Thursday, Eighteenth Week in Ordinary Time

In this morning’s gospel reading, Jesus addresses Peter in two very contrasting ways. He initially addresses Peter as the Rock, ‘You are Peter and on this rock I will build my church’. However, within the space of a few verses, Jesus then addresses Peter as Satan, ‘Get behind me Satan! You are an obstacle in my path’. Having addressed Peter as the rock on which he can build, Jesus then identifies him as a stumbling stone, an obstacle on Jesus’ path, because he was not thinking in God’s way. The fact that Peter could be a stumbling stone did not mean that he ceased to be the rock. Peter, like every human being, was complex. He was a mixture of wheat and weeds, to use an image from one of Jesus’ parables. In spite of his failings, Jesus appointed Peter as the rock, the focal point, of the new community he came to form. The Lord keeps faith in us even after we have failed him. The Lord can work powerfully in and through flawed human beings. What he does ask of us is that we keep striving for God’s way, as against a merely human way.

And/Or

(iv) Thursday, Eighteenth week in ordinary time

In this morning’s gospel reading, Simon Peter shows great insight into Jesus, when he confesses him to be the Christ, the Son of the living God. This is the insight of faith. Jesus tells Peter that his insight is a graced insight. It is given to him by God. Faith, including the insight that faith gives rise to, is not just a human quality. It is a gift from God. It is because of Peter’s faith that Jesus declares him to be the rock on which he will build his church. Peter will have a foundational role in Jesus’ church. Jesus gives him a special authority, symbolized by the keys, and then indentifies this authority as a teaching authority. The task of binding and losing refers to Peter’s authoritative role in interpreting the teaching of Jesus for the community of believes. We have here a very exalted portrait of Peter as a man of deep faith which equips him for a teaching role in the church. Yet, this teacher immediately shows himself to be a slow learning. Jesus began to teach his disciples about the need for him to go to Jerusalem where he would suffer and die. Peter would have none of this talk; he rebuked Jesus for it. Peter’s faith in Jesus did not embrace the cross. The Son of the living God could not suffer and be put to death – be crucified. Because of Peter’s resistance to this suffering and vulnerable dimension of Jesus’ identity, Jesus now addresses him as an obstacle, a stumbling stone, an agent of Satan. The rock becomes a stumbling stone to trip Jesus up. Within one short reading, we see the best of Peter and the worst of Peter. He clearly had a lot of growing in faith to do. We are all people of faith here this morning. Yet we all need to grow in faith as well. We can never become complacent about our faith; we are always on a journey. God may have begun a good work in us, but he has yet to bring it to completion. Like Peter we can all have our bad moments when it comes to our relationship with Jesus and the living out of that relationship. Yet, the Lord continues to invest in us, as he continued to invest in Peter. We are not defined by our failures. They do not block the Lord from continuing his good work in our lives of bringing us to an ever deeper relationship with himself.

And/Or

(v) Thursday, Eighteenth Week in Ordinary Time

The first question that Jesus asks of his disciples, ‘Who do people say the Son of Man is?’ is a relatively easy one. Even today we probably all feel we could say something about how other people see Jesus. Jesus’ second question is a more difficult one, because it is much more personal, ‘Who do you say I am?’ The question invites us to give our own personal confession of faith in Jesus. ‘Who is Jesus for me?’ We might struggle a little more to answer that question. We don’t always find it easy to articulate our own personal faith in the Lord. In the gospel reading, Peter comes forward to give his own personal answer to Jesus’ question, ‘You are the Christ, the Son of the living God’. It is a great answer really and Jesus declares Peter blessed because of this God-given insight he has into the identity of Jesus. Because of his answer Jesus sees in Peter the rock on which he can build his church. Peter can be the firm foundation on which the community of believers relies. He can be entrusted with the keys of the kingdom of heaven which allows him to bind and loose. The image of ‘keys’ suggests authority. The language of binding and loosing specifies that authority as a teaching authority. Peter is being given a very important role in Jesus’ church. Yet almost immediately Peter, the rock, because a stumbling stone for Jesus. When Jesus explains the kind of Christ or Messiah he will be, namely, one who is to suffer grievously and be put to death, Peter rebukes Jesus and tries to deflect him from this path. The one whom Jesus declared blessed is now identified by Jesus as Satan. Jesus did not take back the role in his church he had given Peter, but he was reminding Peter in no uncertain terms that he had a lot to learn. We all have a lot to learn when it comes to Jesus. We are constantly having to surrender to who Jesus is in all his mysterious reality, rather than trying to shape him in accordance with our own wishes.

And/Or

(vi) Thursday, Eighteenth Week in Ordinary Time

There is a striking contrast between the first part of today’s gospel reading and the second part. In the first part, Simon Peter shows great insight into the identity of Jesus, ‘You are the Christ, the Son of the living God’. In response, Jesus gives Peter a hugely significant leadership role in his growing community of disciples. Peter is to be the rock on which Jesus will build his church. Peter will have authority in the church, symbolized by the keys. The language of binding and loosening suggests this is primarily a teaching authority; he will have authority to declare which elements of Jesus’ teaching are binding and which can be interpreted more loosely. There is no other person in the gospels to whom Jesus gives such a significant role. However, in the second part of the gospel reading, this same Peter who is to be the rock is declared by Jesus to be an obstacle, a stumbling stone, in his path, and he is addressed by Jesus as Satan. It is hard to imagine a greater fall from grace in such a short space of time. What had changed? Peter’s inspired insight into Jesus’ identity as the Son of living God had given way to Peter’s rebuke of Jesus when Jesus declared that the Son of the living God would also be the suffering Son of Man who would be put to death by his enemies. Peter’ fall from grace reminds us that we have to allow Jesus to tell us who he really is, rather than trying to impose on Jesus who we think he should be. Jesus is both the glorious Son of God and the suffering Son of Man. We cannot fully understand Jesus apart from the cross. As Son of God, he revealed God’s unconditional love for all, a love that would cost him not less than everything. Such a love makes us truly beloved, but also calls on us to love others in the same self-emptying way as the Lord has loved us.

8th August >> Fr. Martin's Reflections/Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for Thursday, Eighteenth Week in Ordinary Time (Inc. Matthew 16:13-23): ‘Who do you say I am?’ (2024)